Month: December 2014

People’s organisations say officials did not follow the correct procedure of informing village residents about the project. The environment impact assessment is also ridden with shortcomings

TEXT FROM DOWN TO EARTH DATED: DECEMBER 30 2014 BY APARNA PALLAVI

“We do not know what this project is about,” says Kamlesh Prasad Yadav, resident of Palkohan village in Chhatarpur district of Madhya Pradesh. “We came only because a jeep came to our village, saying we were going to be displaced and that we should come to the public hearing. We have come to demand a fair compensation for displacement, because we know we can’t stop the government from throwing us out.”

Kamlesh is one of more than 1,000 project-affected residents who attended the public hearings of the Centre’s proposed Ken-Betwa river link project. The hearings were held in Silon village in Chhatarpur district on December – Read more

In the name of economic reforms and development, the government has taken a significant step backward in India’s march to land justice. The pushing through of the Land Act ordinance violates all democratic norms

FROM THE HINDU DATED: DECEMBER 31 2014 BY JAIRAM RAMESH AND MUHAMMAD KHAN

On Monday, the Bharatiya Janata Party government cleared the proposed ordinance to amend the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act 2013. This amendment, insofar as has been made known to the public, creates a separate category of projects which shall be “fast tracked.” The items covered under this category include industrial corridors, defence and defence production, rural infrastructure including electrification, housing for the poor including affordable housing, and infrastructure projects including projects taken up under Public-Private Partnership (PPP) mode.

The immediate and likely impact of this amendment is that land can now be acquired for these projects Read more